


Adopted

by KittyPaw



Category: Keeper of the Lost Cities Series - Shannon Messenger
Genre: (Guess who's doing the ditching?), (It's Keefe), Adoption, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Fluff and Humor, Foxfire (Keeper of the Lost Cities), Friend groups, I promise Dex Tam and Linh WILL show up, Middle School Cliques, Popularity, Team Foster-Keefe, The Black Swan (Keeper of the Lost Cities), ditching class
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-12
Updated: 2021-01-12
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:33:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28240953
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KittyPaw/pseuds/KittyPaw
Summary: Sophie came to the Lost Cities at twelve years old. The council did not deny the Vackers' request to adopt her.Now, Sophie is welcome and fairly popular in Foxfire. But sheisgetting mysterious and growingly desperate notes from some people apparently called the Black Swan, vying for her attention at almost every moment. Sophie's decision to ignore them just might change the intended course of events for Project Moonlark.Also, Sophie really likes this Keefe kid. He's kind of cute, if she's being honest.Sophie Vacker AU where she is Biana's and Fitz's sibling. Includes Dex and Keefe, as well as eventually Tam and Linh.
Relationships: Sophie Foster & Alden Vacker, Sophie Foster & Biana Vacker, Sophie Foster & Della Vacker, Sophie Foster & Fitz Vacker, Sophie Foster/Keefe Sencen, sophie foster & Alvar vacker
Comments: 6
Kudos: 15





	Adopted

Sophie had just finished trying on all of the outfits Della had picked out for her in Atlantis, and she was getting _seriously_ itchy from all the sparkles and frills. So in the end, it was a relief when Della allowed her to change into a simple pretty yellow dress - a _comfortable_ yellow dress.

She never thought she'd be this happy to see a dress.

Della smiled when she noted that Sophie liked it. "I figured this one was more your style."

"I love it," Sophie said sincerely, twirling around. "It's beautiful."

"It really brings out the beautiful gold flecks in your eyes," Della said warmly. "Now come upstairs! Biana must have finished decorating your room." She took Sophie's hand and began to lead her up the tall and fancy stairs of Everglen. "Just a bit of a warning," she whispered, "I really hope you like pink."

Of course. It was Biana.

"Hey Sophie!" Biana smiled widely and guestured at the door. "Go on, walk into your new room!" She squealed with the excitement of middle schoolers who found out their friend had a crush while Sophie tentatively opened the door.

Della was right about the pink.

Pink bed, pink covers, pink throw pillows. Pink walls, pink vanity. If it weren't for the white mixed in, there would have been too much pink.

"I figured you probably didn't like pink _quite_ as much as me, so it's a little less than my room," Biana explained.

Sophie worried about Biana's room. She laughed a bit at the thought, and smiled. "Biana, it's beautiful."

"I'm _so_ glad you like it! Now come on. I'm going to do your makeup whether you want me to or not."

~

Biana and Fitz had defintitely overdone it for the first day of school - at least by human standards. Biana had just as much makeup on, and they wore the same Foxfire level three uniforms. They'd tried to put her in level two, but then Fitz had said all kinds of stuff about elf age counting versus human age counting with that charisma of his, gotten Alden to back him up, and now here she was, with Biana, gathering for the morning at her new school.

"And we welcome," Dame Alina announced, "our newest student, Sophie Elizabeth Foster."

In the silence, Sophie worried that they were weirded out by her. But then Dame Alina finished her statement: "The newest adopted member of the Vacker family." There was the applause.

Biana smiled at her. "See? You're going to be as popular as me in no time. Ooh! There's Maruca." Biana dragged Sophie over to where one of her other friends - dark skinned, with pretty dreadlocks in a bun - waited for her. "Hey, girl! This is our new friend!"

Maruca looked at her with an appraising smile on her face. "She's your new sister? That's pretty cool. Why isn't she joining till now?"

Biana shrugged. "Apparently grew up with humans. I know, right? It's like _right out_ of a YA novel!"

Maruca covered her mouth and giggled. "Oh my gosh, Biana. We're in a literal YA novel!"

"Not literal," Sophie muttered.

Maruca raised an eyebrow. "And she's a grammar nerd, too. We can work with that. Alright! What's your Monday morning session, Sophie?"

Sophie racked her photographic memory for her schedule. "I have... Elementalism."

Maruca smiled in that bubble-gummy way she new all the popular girls in high school had done - the people Sophie had always shrunk away from, because though bubble-gummy smiles where _never_ directed at her.

This was definitely new.

"Don't get electrocuted!" Biana wished her well. Sophie's eyes widened.

"Wait. What?"

But they had already moved on. "I have Alchemy," Maruca said. "You?"

"Ability detecing," Biana said with a sigh.

"I can't believe we're not in the same Ability detecting class!" Maruca whined. "There's only so many sessions with more than one prodigy." She rolled her eyes. "See you guys at lunch!"

~

Sophie did, in fact, get electrocuted.

Which was how she ended up in the healing center, with that doctor guy - Elwin. Which was somewhere her doctor-hating self definitely did _not_ want to be.

"How long was I unconscious?"

"I don't know why he didn't tell you how to bottle lightning before just setting it loose on you," he said with a shake of his head. "That's not how that works. I'll have another talk with Sir Conley about protocol in the situation of a new kid."

"I bet it doesn't happen very often," Sophie said, sitting up a bit as she got less groggy. "Um, why am I okay?"

"You're the very first," Elwin confirmed. "And you're okay because this is easily treated by our medicine, something that no doubt it a lot harder in human hospitals, I imagine."

Sophie nodded.

"Well, I'd get a bit of rest, and then you can get your accident-prone self to lunch." Accident-prone? Sophie really hoped he wasn't right. "Meanwhile... how are you doing over there?" He directed his attention to another patient.

"I'm so sick," the guy's voice said sarcastically. His tone definitely screamed _too cool for school guy_! "I can't even _walk_. I guess you'll just have to keep me here the rest of the day so I miss all my classes and detention."

"Very funny, Keefe." Elwin shook his head. Sophie sat up and looked over at the boy - Keefe - who definitely did _not_ look sick. He was smirking, as if he was entirely unashamed of his attempt to get out of class. His dirty-blonde hair was extremely messy, but in a way that suggested he'd spent hours making it look like that. His ice blue eyes landed on her.

"Hey, you're the new girl, right?"

The absolute last thing Sophie wanted to do right now was sit in the healing center next to a troublemaker and discuss her origins. "Um, yes."

Keefe shrugged. "It's causing _lots_ of talk. There's all kinds of rumors - my favorite is that you were raised with humans."

"I was."

Keefe's eyes widened, showing his suprise, but he kept his cool attitude through it. "Wow, looks like Keefe is always right, isn't he." He chuckled a bit. "I'm Keefe."

"Sophie."

"Well, it's nice to meet you, Sophie," Keefe said with a cocky smile.

"Nice to meet you too."

"Well guys, it's time for lunch," Elwin informed them. "So... shoo. You go find your friends. You go to lunch detention."

"I don't have lunch detention today." Keefe put an offended hand over his heart. "I have after-school detention all month. I have _lunch detention_ the next three days."

Elwin rolled his eyes and chuckled a bit. "Alright then. Maybe you can walk Sophie to lunch."

Sophie wanted to say no, she knew where she was going, and go find Biana and her friend. But Keefe said, "Sure! I can even give Sophie a tour of all the places I've caused trouble."

"You mean, a tour of the whole school?" Elwin said dryly.

"Exactly! Glad you understand." Keefe grabbed Sophie hand and yanked her off the healing center bed. "Alright, come on. Hey, what were you doing in here anyway?"

Sophie sighed. "I got electrocuted. Sir Conley didn't even tell me _how_ to bottle lightning. He wanted a 'demonstration of my current abilities,'" Sophie quoted sarcastically, rolling her eyes.

"Wow. That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard. And also epic, because I've never gotten electrocuted. Maybe I should do it on purpose some time." Keefe made a show of thinking about it. "Nah, I'll stick to ditching the class. Speaking of which, what's your afternoon session? We could ditch together."

"Universe with Sir Astin," Sophie told him. "And I don't ditch classes."

"Come on, do you _want_ the reputation of a goody-two-shoes? Trust me, it's _super_ cool to be involved in my schemes. The girls will die of jealousy when they see us hanging out," Keefe said with a wink.

Sophie's cheeks heated up a bit. "No. I need to build a good reputation of always being on time to my classes."

"Ah, like a true Vacker." Keefe shrugged. "Eh, Fitz is the same way. Can't say I'm surprised."

"You're friends with Fitz?" Sophie asked, surprised. Then again, kind of not. The Vackers struck her as a sort of prestigious family, automatically making them famous - and Keefe struck her as popular. It made sense.

"Yep. And, since you're his sister now, I assume you'll be sitting with him, Biana, and Biana's friends, meaning I'm your new tablemate!" Keefe grinned. "We would have eventually met anyway."

"Unfortunately," Sophie muttered dryly, though she didn't entirely mean it. Keefe was growing on her.

"And _that_ is the attitude of someone who is going to get along _great_ with me." Kids began to file into the hallways, towards the lunchroom. "Come on! I can show you to the lunchroom." Then Keefe raised an eyebrow. "Watch this."

Keefe grabbed her hand, and as he led her through the hallways, some of the girls started whispering. Keefe laughed. "I'm an empath, so I can feel their emotions," he explained. "The ladies all love me. So it's easy to make them jealous."

Sophie rolled her eyes as he led her to their table, where sure enough, Biana, Fitz, and Biana's friend Maruca sat together. "Hey Keefe," Biana said with a flirtatious giggle and wave.

Keefe smirked a bit as he sat down next to Fitz. Sophie sat down opposite him, next to Biana.

"I see you've met Keefe," Biana said to Sophie, slighly challengingly. But it was so slight, Sophie could have imagined it. "How'd you find each other?"

"Healing center. Got electrocuted," Sophie muttered.

Maruca laughed. "I _warned_ you, Sophie!"

"And _I_ was very expertly ditching my elvin History class," Keefe said with a smirk. "He caught me sneaking out - I know, right? Once in a lifetime it happens - so I just said I was sick and had to go to the healers." He shrugged.

"He _believed_ you?" Fitz asked incredulously.

Keefe shrugged. "He's old and Dame Alina only keeps him around because he compliments her hair."

"Hair compliments are very important," Biana said seriously.

Sophie smiled sardonically and shook her head as she ate her weird gnomish food. With this crowd around to do all of the talking, maybe Sophie could blend in with the popular kids, and therefore...

...maybe she'd actually _like_ school this year. Maybe Fitz was right: This _was_ where she belonged.

**Author's Note:**

> So, yeah, the thing about Dame Alina keeping Keefe's history teacher around because he compliments her hair is from Unlocked.
> 
> I hope you enjoyed the first chapter, because there _are_ more to come!


End file.
